HAMILTON, Ont. — With a judge saying there is no prospect of proving Christina Noudga knew her then-boyfriend Dellen Millard had killed Tim Bosma when she helped him destroy and hide evidence in the high-profile case, the woman who drew sharp criticism for her love and support of Millard accepted a gentle plea deal Tuesday.

Noudga, 24, was originally charged with being an accessory after the fact of murder in the slaying of Bosma, a 32-year-old Hamilton father killed in 2013 after taking two strangers on a test drive of a pickup truck he was selling online.

Instead, she pleaded guilty to a charge of obstructing justice and was sentenced to one day in custody, added to punishment she has already served.

“On the facts before me, as agreed to by the accused and tendered by the Crown, I would find independently that there would be insufficient evidence that would prove, beyond a reasonable doubt, that the accused knew about the murder that had just occurred,” said Ontario Superior Court of Justice Judge Toni Skarica.

Noudga served four months in pre-trial custody, which under the law is equivalent to a six-month jail term. This was followed by 2.3 years of house arrest while on bail, with about 10 months of that wearing a monitoring bracelet.

That was all deemed to be equivalent to a one-year sentence. Because of a technicality of sentencing, Skarica added one day in custody. That day, however, was itself a formality and she was free 90 minutes later. She also had to submit her DNA to the crime databank.

In an eight-page agreed statement of facts read aloud in court by Assistant Crown Attorney Brett Moodie, Noudga admitted she helped move, destroy and hide evidence relevant to the police investigation into Bosma’s murder, but without knowing of the murder.

Bosma left his wife and young daughter on May 6, 2013, to take Millard and Mark Smich on a test drive of his Dodge Ram 3500 truck. Soon after leaving his driveway, Bosma was shot and his body cremated in a large animal incinerator.

Court heard Millard and Noudga were texting each other on the night of the murder, with Millard saying he was on “a mission” that would be an “all nighter.” She offered to help, although there was no evidence she knew what he was doing.

On May 9, 2013, Millard gave her a digital video recording box and told her to keep it for him. The device contained security video of Millard and Smich at Millard’s hangar at Waterloo airport on the night of the murder. She hid it in her bedroom for a year until she was arrested, but said she had no idea what it was.

Court Exhibit Photo

That same night, she joined Millard while he towed a large trailer, which had Bosma’s bloodstained truck inside, to his mother’s house north of Toronto. There was no evidence, however, she knew what was inside, the agreed statement of facts says.

(In a remarkable moment at Millard’s trial, Noudga told the jury their hour-long drive featured no real conversation because she was busy giving Millard a lengthy “sexual favour.” No mention of the sex act was made in court Tuesday.)

The couple then went to Millard’s hangar and — while wearing black, synthetic rubber gloves — moved some things around and switched vehicles.

They then drove to Millard’s farm in North Dumfries and, in the dark of night and again wearing the gloves, towed the incinerator, ominously called The Eliminator and which was stained with Bosma’s blood and contained his charred remains, from the barn and hid it in the woods. She said Millard told her it needed to be moved because the barn’s old floorboards were creaking under its weight.

The couple then delivered a locked toolbox containing a gun to their friend, Matt Hagerman. Smich earlier testified it was the gun used to kill Bosma.

Handout via Canadian Press

“She was not told what was in the toolbox,” the statement says.

After Millard’s arrest — despite Bosma still deemed a missing person — instead of calling police about his trailer, she drove to it with Millard’s mother, Madeleine Burns, and wiped down the trailer’s hitch and locks.

“Noudga was concerned about being associated with a crime and deliberately and with forethought she wiped her prints and Madeline’s (sic) prints from the trailer. This would have the effect of removing Millard’s fingerprints,” says the statement.

At Millard’s trial she disputed the damage her wiping had done by saying: “We didn’t eliminate evidence. We just wiped our fingerprints,” bringing rancorous laughter from spectators.

Noudga’s lawyer, Brian Greenspan, said his client has no prior criminal record and lives with her parents in the Toronto area. She came to Canada from Ukraine when she was three.

She started dating Millard when she was 18, he said, and he was “older and controlling in many ways.”

Peter J Thompson / National Post

Noudga didn’t distance herself from Millard until after she was arrested two years later. (“I absolutely have no feelings of emotion for him,” she said at Millard’s trial. After spending “four months of my life in a tiny box,” after her arrest she fell out of love with him.)

Greenspan said Noudga has her bachelor of science degree in the health science field with a minor in psychology, works as a lifeguard and a CPR instructor, and is involved as a campaigner with human rights organizations.

She had intended to go to medical school, but had to delay her education because of her charges. She has a pending health care job arranged and plans to reactivate her post-graduate medical education.

Assistant Crown Attorney Craig Fraser said the plea deal was supported by the Bosma family and the police.

Peter J Thompson / National Post

Skarica accepted it immediately.

“Obstructing justice is always a serious offence. A significant mitigating factor here is the guilty plea entered by the accused, particularly since it has prevented the Bosma family…from having to relive this terrible tragedy once again,” the judge said.

When Skarica offered her the chance to say something to the court, she politely stood and, with hands clasped in front of her, said: “Umm, no thank you, Your Honour.”

Skarica, however, had a message for her.

“You learn in life that when you keep company with bad people — and these people were beyond bad, they were evil — that when you keep company with people like that, bad things happen to you. The corollary is that, if you keep company with good people, good things happen to you.

“I hope you conduct your future life in that way.”

Throughout the hour-long hearing, Noudga sat solemnly, looking respectfully at whichever officials was speaking. She was dressed in a navy blouse and black, high-waisted skirt, her dark hair pulled tightly back behind her head.

You learn in life that when you keep company with bad people — and these people were beyond bad, they were evil — that when you keep company with people like that, bad things happen to you

Her demeanour was different from when she was a reluctant witness at the Millard and Smich murder trial.

Noudga achieved a rare feat during her evidence last April and May; at an emotional murder case against two killers, for many spectators, she was the least likeable person in the room.

For Millard’s trial she arrived at court laughably masked in a pantomime of hiding, elaborately wrapped in scarves and sunglasses. On the stand over days of questioning, her answers seemed evasive and tetchy.

Her testimony frequently brought groans of frustration at her apparent obtuseness from the packed courtroom: “I don’t recall,” “I have no idea,” “nothing stands out to me” and “not to my personal recollection,” became her hallmark answers.

Noudga was the only witness at Millard and Smich’s trial granted protection under the Canada Evidence Act. In Canada, witnesses cannot decline to answer, however, a judge can order that their testimony cannot be used against them at another proceeding.

Her public arrival Tuesday for her own hearing was also more restrained, although she still worked to hide her face.

Millard, 31, and Smich, 28, were found guilty of first-degree murder in the death of Bosma and sentenced to life in prison. Both have filed to appeal their convictions.

Bosma’s disappearance on May 6, 2013, triggered a reaction not only in Hamilton but around the world. A huge public search, followed by the news of Bosma’s death, created an emotional attachment to the case for many people.

At trial, the jury read Millard’s letters, smuggled from jail to Noudga, in which he plotted to tamper with evidence, change witness testimony and manipulate jurors — which he said was the only way he could avoid a life sentence.

Millard and Smich each face a charge of first-degree murder in the death of Laura Babcock, Millard’s former girlfriend, and Millard is further charged with another murder, that of Wayne Millard, his father. Those trials are scheduled for next year.